


Worth

by Nefhiriel



Series: White Collar - Ancient 'Verse [1]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Slavery, Ancient Rome, Angst, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-20
Updated: 2011-05-20
Packaged: 2017-10-19 14:57:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/202089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nefhiriel/pseuds/Nefhiriel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Not the quarries or mines, Peter. He does not belong there. You cannot send him there. Please tell me you will not.” (Ancient world AU. Peter and Elizabeth are wealthy members of the patrician class. Neal is not.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worth

**Author's Note:**

> Written in response to [an anonymous prompt](http://collarcorner.livejournal.com/2615.html?thread=59703#t59703) left at collarcorner.
> 
> As dubbed by my beta-sister Imbecamiel, this may be considered: “ancient not-quite-Rome.” The culture and setting approximate to that, without being quite historically/geographically pinned down.
> 
> I thought about using more time-period/culturally appropriate names for everyone, but decided it just wouldn't be them if I did. So, for the author's purposes, let us just say that this story has been translated from the original Latin, using the modern equivalents of the character's names—which, quite happily, happen to be Peter, Elizabeth, and Neal. Really. Just trust me on this. ^^

“Please, Peter?”

Peter would never tell her how endearing it was when she pouted like this, mouth scrunched up, childishly.

How could he say no? _For her own good,_ he reminded himself. She'd already admitted the slave had a history as a thief. He did not need to hear more.

Elizabeth was the most beautiful woman Peter had ever met, and also the most caring. Sometimes, she cared too much, too freely, leaving herself vulnerable to hurt. And she was Peter's to protect. If he had to play the hard-hearted villain to do so, then so be it.

But he hated being a villain in her eyes. He hated inflicting a small hurt, even to negate a bigger one.

It didn't help that she was looking particularly goddess-like, with her wind-blown hair curling out from beneath the golden bands, refusing to stay pinned up. Her cheeks were flushed, and her red-trimmed peplos fluttered lightly in the breeze coming through from the open doors to the garden.

When Peter didn't immediately respond, she leaned against the doorway, resting her head against it. Her expression smoothed from a pout into a heavy look of sadness. Peter knew that expression. She had a cause—and however newly acquired, it was already close to her heart.

Peter wanted to cross the small study and kiss her; kiss away the look of sympathetic pain that didn't belong on her pretty face. He could not care less if the general public _did_ consider it weak in a man to openly show his love. He _loved_ his wife. He would have married her even if the family connections had not been so mutually advantageous.

“He's just a _boy_ , Peter,” El said softly, drawing him back to the plight he was in—with the woman he loved and hated to disappoint.

“I'll see that he is taken care of.”

Far from reassuring, it made El stiffen. She shook her head vehemently. “Not the quarries or mines, Peter. He does not belong there. You _cannot_ send him there. Please tell me you will not.”

She was so certain of her assessment—of a slave she'd seen for the first time but hours ago. But no matter his own doubts and misgivings, Peter could not bear to see her look at him with fear like that. He closed the distance between them, putting his hands on her shoulders and kissing her tenderly on the forehead.

“I will see that he is taken care of—to your satisfaction, my dear.”

“ _My_ satisfaction?” She had to tilt her head back to look up at him. There was hope in her look.

“Entirely.” Peter knew he was about to disappoint that hope. “Provided he does not remain here. There are plenty of male servants for your protection, and for the heavier work around the villa. I meant for you to find a female slave—a companion—for while I am away.”

“I have all the company I need already. Indeed, I have more company, and more possessions, than I could ever want. Peter...” She hesitated. “The truth is, I was already on my way back, without having had any success, when I saw...” She turned her face away as she trailed off.

“El?” Peter used two fingers under her chin to gently draw her back.

“They were beating him as if they would not stop. He did not sell—not for a pittance. He was worth nothing to them.”

“He is a _thief_ , El,” Peter reminded as gently as he could.

Of course he had not sold. Slaves with a reputation like that were only purchased for manual labor—for the quarries and mines. It was reality. It was likely that this “boy” who had so captured her pity did not look capable of surviving long under harsh conditions, and thus had not appeared to be worth the risk or cost to anyone who might have otherwise been interested, even in a thief-slave, for mere cheaply-bought muscle. Slave merchants were required by law to state what they knew of a slave's criminal history. When a slave would not sell due to their criminal past, then their life—in the monetary sense—did indeed become nothing.

“They would have killed him.”

Looking at her, so sorrowful over grim reality, and unwilling to accept it even if the rest of the world did, Peter knew exactly why he loved her so much.

“Do not cry...shh, El,” he said in haste, when he saw the brightness of her eyes. “I only think of your safety. I hate to leave you alone at all. And for you to keep a known criminal near you...”

“He is not _dangerous_ , Peter. He is not a criminal like _that_. Not violent.” She gave a warning shake of her head, reminding Peter of a free-spirited horse. “No, do not give me that _look_. I may not understand the uglier side of life as you do, but I cannot believe this slave would ever cause me, or anyone, harm. He is far too...intelligent.”

This did nothing to allay Peter's fears. To the contrary.

She saw that he was not convinced, and knew it was time use the tactics that were tested and true. Giving a little sigh, she nestled herself against him, arms encircling his waist. She murmuring against his chest, so quietly he had to bend his head near hers to hear: “Sometimes, dearest, it is not enough for a woman to have all she needs, or even all she wants.”

Peter knew he was walking into her trap. He had commanded garrisons, and fought battles, and proven his mind keen for strategy. Yet no matter how many wars he won he would always remain defeated by this small, fierce creature with the pleading eyes, who fit so perfectly in his arms.

“Then what do you lack?” he asked, though he already knew what she was after. “Tell me.”

“To _be_ needed.”

“El,” he spoke with soft reproach, “I have always needed you.”

“You have always loved me,” she corrected.

“ _And_ needed you—”

She pulled back enough to put a silencing finger to his lips. “This household is my small domain; my province; my world while you are away.”

“If you need change—perhaps to visit your sister for a time—you have but to say the word. If I had known you were unhappy...”

“I am _not_ unhappy. I did not feel that there was anything missing, until...” She had a curious look of bemusement on her face. Self-bemusment. “He needed me, Peter, and I could not turn my back.”

She left it to her husband, and his proven brilliance, to understand the rest of what she was trying to tell him. She had taken this one under her wing, giving him refuge in this, her province. And now Peter—who might be gone tomorrow, or next week, or next month, and for the gods alone knew how long—was telling her to cast him outside again. To turn her back on a need she knew she could solve. Of course she cared. It was in her nature to care, and to want to be needed, just as it was in Peter's nature to be skeptical, and to want to protect her from all threats.

Peter pressed his lips to the top of her head, lingering there in thought. Not without trepidation, he finally promised, “I will consider the idea. After I have seen the slave.”

Her arms tightened around him, and she breathed a contented “I love you,” as if she had just received a full concession, and had known Peter would make it all along.

Peter thought maybe she never could see the hard-hearted villain in him, because whenever she was near him she turned him into a soft-hearted fool.

***

The slave did not form the cringing, skulking picture Peter had somehow been expecting. Perhaps he had been assuming the object of so much of his wife's pity would be pathetic.

However, it was all too apparent why the merchants had been on the verge of giving up if their only hope was to sell him for hard labor. He was shorter than Peter, though only by a little. But it was his build—the way the white tunic hung loosely from his shoulders—that made him look more like scholar material than anything. And who would want to make a scholar, or even scribe, out of a thief? Who could put _him_ in any position of trust?

There was something about his bearing that Peter thought belied these first impressions. He had not commanded hundreds of men without becoming a decent judge of their character and capabilities, and there was about the slave a coiled wiriness that suggested hidden reserves of stamina, for all he lacked in bulk.

Still, standing there with his head bent and a splinted right arm tucked awkwardly against his side, he hardly looked like a threat.

A strange familiarity began to seep in. Though Peter found himself wary of acknowledging it—whatever murky memory from his past was trying to reassert itself into his consciousness—he knew this was not the first time he had seen this slave.

“Look at me.”

The slave slowly lifted his head, eyes remaining locked on the ground.

“No,” Peter directed, not unkindly, “ _look_ at me.”

For a brief moment, Peter thought he'd been mistaken. But then he knew he hadn't been. The cheeks were hollower, the expression more bleak, the face shadowed on the left side by a mess of bruising—but it was him.

“ _You_.” It burst from Peter, strangled, like an accusation. It had been more than three years. The world was too large for coincidences of this nature. Only, apparently, it was not.

The blue eyes were wide in mutual recognition, and despite how unkind the years had clearly been to him, Peter saw in the look the same wide-eyed boy who had attempted to pick the pocket of a imperial soldier, what must have been ten years previously. At the time, he could not have been much older than eleven or twelve. Peter himself had been young, fresh into the army, his rank achieved as yet only on the merit of his family name.

In hindsight, Peter thought the boy might have been small for his age. Small, and dirty, and with eyes full of surprise as Peter had caught him by the wrist, the piece of gold clutched damningly in the boy's fist.

Peter had grabbed him by the front of his shirt, and hauled him off into the privacy of a nearby alley—where he had told the boy in no uncertain terms what an idiot he was. He had sworn at a child, because he had felt for him, and because somehow _this_ child seemed to embody the misfortune of all the small, desperate street rats—orphaned, abandoned, children, worthless to society—who would get themselves killed before they had a chance to grow up and make something of themselves.

Peter had sent the boy running, then—conveniently neglecting to take back the stolen coin.

And that, Peter had expected, was the beginning and end of it. But years later he would meet him again, though at first only in reputation as a faceless thief. Who knew how much he had really stolen in the course of his life. Peter suspected he was guilty of far more than they would have ever been able to prove.

Peter might have never made the connection between the young, incompetent pick-pocket, and the grown-up, fully competent thief. Thieves were not rare in the large cities, even good thieves—though perhaps most of them weren't as skilled at escaping as this one. But as the fates would have it, Peter was to see for himself what had become of his charitable moment of weakness. It was he and several of his men who had been the ones called upon to apprehend a criminal—a thief caught in the act, cornered, who had looked at Peter with blue eyes full of surprise.

Peter _had_ warned him.

But, after the first surprise had passed, the thief had only smiled at him, as if it were the best jest in the whole world to meet Peter again under such ironically paralleled circumstances. He had found his poise, at least; no longer the frightened boy.

Peter had never learned his name. He had not wanted to. It was his duty to see punishment meted out, and punishment in this case had been slavery. Not an uncommon sentence for a thief. Even if the thief were uncommon.

Right now, however, he saw neither the foolish boy with intelligent eyes, nor the confident thief with the impetuous smile. He saw someone gaunt and trampled, and the slave stared at Peter like a half-starved animal that had just looked up and heard the hawk's hunting cry, and knew he did not have the energy to flee. He was afraid, struggling to look resigned. The result was something between careful blankness and insurmountable terror.

Peter supposed his own intent stare might have had something to do with the reaction. That, and the fact that the last time they had seen each other Peter had been handing him over to the slave merchants.

“There's no need to be afraid. I have no intention of sending you to the mines or—” Peter stopped mid-reassurance at the subtle, sardonic expression he caught in the slave's eye. “You have already been there,” he realized. “For how long?”

“Nearly two years. My lord.”

“Two years?” Peter swallowed back surprise, and the uncomfortable lump in his throat. “How...”

“I am stronger than I look, my lord.” There was that subtle, almost non-existent sarcastic lift of an eyebrow again.

“Indeed.” Yes, and as much in mind as in body, Peter guessed.

Neither of them was admitting anything. Other than that initial moment of reaction, they seemed mutually unwilling to acknowledge the past. And yet there the past was, coincidence, fate, or a part of some master design.

“I wondered what became of you,” Peter said, before he could think better of it.

The slave's lips seemed to twitch minutely, but he said nothing.

“I warned you,” Peter added sternly. Then he realized he had just admitted more than he had ever intended to. He was not _guilty_ , and he had no reason to absolve himself, or justify himself, to a thief and a slave who had dug a pit to bury himself in.

Peter turned away, paced a step towards his desk, stopped. He had been right to insist El allow him to conduct this interview without her present, even though he couldn't have known how complicated the situation was about to become.

“What is your name?” he asked, his back still to the slave.

“Neal.”

“Neal.” Peter turned back to face him, to study him, testing the name, finally matching it to the face it belonged to. El was right. They were intelligent eyes. Too intelligent, Peter had thought, to make such a mess of his life. “My wife has just bought you another chance. Use it well, and maybe you will have a chance at freedom again one day.”

Peter was satisfied when the blue eyes widened slightly in surprise—and, maybe, gratitude.


End file.
